Field of the Disclosure
This application relates generally to improvements in highly automated or autonomous vehicles. More particularly the present disclosure relates to applying driver preferences and historic driving performance in determining an optimized route for autonomous vehicles.
Description of the Related Art
In a conventional navigation system, a driver can input a destination address and the navigation system determines the directions to the destination based on the map stored or accessible to the conventional navigation system. The conventional navigation system is equipped with a global positioning sensor (GPS) to determine a current position of the vehicle. Based on the current position, the conventional navigation system guides the driver to the destination, using audible and visual instructions. As more than one route is available between the current position and the destination, the conventional navigation system choses which route or routes to offer the driver. Often, the route is selected by considering factors of importance for non-autonomous driving such as travel distance or travel time. Furthermore, some navigation systems integrate traffic, road event such as repair or accident related information into the directions, thereby giving the driver flexibility to select a less congested routes.
The conventional navigations, although helpful and suitable for a non-autonomous vehicle, are not adaptive and do not account for factors of interest for autonomous driving. For example, the conventional navigation system routing may not be able to account for hands-free time or sleep time, which are some of the enhanced capabilities of the autonomous vehicle over the non-autonomous vehicle, during a route determination and selection.
Autonomous vehicle is a next generation automotive vehicles with highly increased functionalities and vehicle performance in terms of driving automation. Autonomous vehicle can not only improve driving performance and overall vehicle performance, but also allow driver to sleep, take hands off the wheels, and take eyes off the road, etc. in certain situations. To enable such increased capabilities of a vehicle, several smart components including smart sensors, and communication with driver and other vehicles is necessary. Among the increased capabilities, an efficient routing or navigation system needs to be included that is capable of creating routes that meet the driver's desired autonomous support, which the limited capabilities of conventional navigation systems do not. As such, there remains a continuing need to provide improved navigation systems for autonomous vehicles.